In this episode, filmed at Goldman Sachs’ Builders + Innovators Summit, Bob Pittman discusses growing iHeartMedia into the largest radio network in the country and the key to connecting with consumers in an ever-changing media landscape.
On building successful programming: “We often coach our talent that you’re someone’s best friend sitting in that empty seat next to them in the car every morning. What would you be talking to them about? How would you be interacting? How could you be the most interesting friend so that when they got to work, they were sad the journey was over, as opposed to glad to get you out of the car? And that makes the successful stations.”
On the power of marketing: “I would ask people, ‘Why do you like WABC?’ – which was number one in New York at the time. And they would go, ‘because they play the best music.’ And what WABC did is every time they opened the mic, they said, ‘WABC plays the best music.’ They had jingles for it…. And, by the way, when I researched the music, they weren’t playing the best music, but they had so convinced the audience they had. So I learned it’s not just the sum of the product, it’s also how you market it and what you say about it.”
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